


Power Struggle

by Prochytes



Category: Torchwood
Genre: F/F, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-06
Updated: 2011-05-06
Packaged: 2017-10-19 01:34:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/195420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prochytes/pseuds/Prochytes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How Gwen ended up in charge by the start of Season Two, based on the premise that one should never assume Jack Harkness is joking.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Power Struggle

**Author's Note:**

> The essay Tosh mentions is in Roland Barthes’ "Mythologies" (Paris, 1957). Originally posted on LJ in 2008.

“Right, Tosh,” Gwen frowned, and wished that she had a hand free to scratch her nose, “we’ve got to agree that whichever of us comes out on top in this… ahem….”

“Selection process?” Tosh’s voice was muffled but fairly steady, all things considered.

“…selection process has to make _bloody sure_ that we change it for the next time the chain of command runs out of links. We don’t want to doom anyone else to this.”

“Agremmph…”

“Pardon?”

“Agreed. Sorry. Bit hard to talk right now.”

“You can concede any time you want, you know.”

“You wish.”

Gwen looked out for a moment across the Hub, trying to forget the strain in her shoulders. Her scowl deepened. “Honestly, I should have known something was up when I saw that smirk on the Defence Secretary’s face. ‘In the absence of Captain Harkness, Torchwood Three’s extra-governmental status will only persist if its Emergency Command Protocols are followed to the letter and recorded, Ms. Cooper.’ Bastard. I bet he knew then what that meant. How the hell did we end up with this process, anyway?”

“Long… story.” Tosh gulped in some precious air. “According to Ianto, it was dreamed up by Jack’s predecessor-but-one. Apparently, this guy went to investigate some disappearances in Perivale during the 1980s and came back… a bit peculiar. Kept going on about the purity of nature red in tooth and claw and how civilization had made humanity soft. He must have changed the Protocols to reflect his, er, epiphany.”

“Creepy.”

“Uh-huh. Then he disappeared. There are some fragmentary references in the archives to his team trying to lure him back with catnip. But that can’t be right.”

“Weird. So this guy wrote his own brand of lunacy into the Emergency Command Protocols. Why didn’t anyone notice?”

“It never came up. His successor just ignored them. When Jack took over, he was the only one left. And let’s face it: this isn’t the sort of procedure which _Jack_ would have seen any reason to change.”

“Too right.” Gwen looked thoughtful. “We seem to be at a bit of a stalemate here. Does some sort of time limit apply?”

“Well, it depends on the rules we’re using. Before the revisions in the last century a hold could last for as long as…”

“I can’t believe you looked that up.”

“Knowledge is my edge, Gwen. Always. And in this context, I need every edge I can get.”

“Fair enough.”

“Can you believe that Roland Barthes wrote an essay on the poetics of this sort of thing?”

“Tosh, sweetheart, I’m currently taking on one of my best friends in a naked wrestling match for command of a secret alien-hunting organization down a high-tech Cardiff storm-drain in the shadow of a puzzled pteranodon. I can believe anything.”

“Good point. Shall we both let go and start again?”

“Sounds reasonable.”

“OK. One, two, three and…. break.” Tosh stretched, and eyed Gwen warily. “This would probably be easier if we had Ianto to resolve disputes.”

“I agree. But if he stops guarding that sub-basement then Owen might get out. And if he saw us now, the explosion from his libido overloading could take out South Wales. Anyway, back to business. Nnnh...”

“Uhh….”

“Why was it so hard to push you over? You’re tiny.”

“Low centre of gravity, promoted by careful stance.”

“You _have_ been looking into this.”

“You bet. And I’ve studied all your moves, too. So don’t think that letting your breasts heave fetchingly with the effort will distract me.”

“Curses, foiled again.”

“Not that they aren’t lovely breasts, mind you. I’ve always thought so.”

“Thank you, Tosh. Yours are lovely, too.”

“Since we’re both so far beyond the Awkwardness Event Horizon anyway, I decided that I might as well get that off my chest. And now, strength permitting, I’m going to get your chest off my chest a bit more literally.”

“Give it your best shot.”

Some breathless seconds ensued. Gwen gasped.

“Uhh… Nicely done. I didn’t think you’d manage to break me like that.”

“I’m strong for my size. Not as strong as you, but then you didn’t really have a viable hold there. Speaking of viable holds… how did you beat Owen?”

“It is not beyond the realms of possibility that his groin and my knee might have had a difference of opinion.”

“But that’s just illegal! What if he had cried foul?”

“Then he would have had to admit that he had been _beaten_ by a _girl_ , which Owen would never be able to do, even if she was fighting dirty and he wasn’t. I knew he’d just pretend that he _let_ me win to save his own blushes.”

“Ouch. It’s scary, the way you know how to play people sometimes, Gwen.”

“Like a harp, Tosh. Like a bloody harp. Or like your spine….”

“Oww…”

“Ha. Gotcha. Wriggle out of that, Ms. Houdini.”

“Trying…”

Gwen winced at the pain in her arms and looked up, at the airy vastness of their contested kingdom. No movement but skin on skin. No sound but their own laboured breathing. An odd and empty thing to rule. Had Jack ever _wanted_ all this? She shivered and bent her head once more to Tosh’s back, where the torsion of slender muscles stippled the slight olive canvas with shadow.

“You’re getting weak, Tosh. I can feel it. Are you sure you don’t want to concede?”

“I’m… I’m sure.”

“OK. So, in the spirit of give and take, how did you triumph over Ianto?”

“That… that was easy. Ianto’s a perfect gentleman. He was never… never going to lay a finger on a girl. A tiny girl. A tiny girl with glasses. A tiny girl with glasses without her glasses.” Tosh drew a shuddering breath. “Five seconds in and he conceded out of embarrassment.”

“Aw, bless. We know our boys so well. But I’m not as sure as I was that I know you.”

“What.. do you mean, Gwen?”

“Tosh, you’re exhausted. You may be a scarily devious opponent, but I’m bigger and stronger and heavier and, frankly, nastier than you. You must know that you can’t win this. Why do you keep fighting? Why do you want so much to be in charge?”

Silence.

“Tosh?”

Tosh’s voice was so quiet that Gwen could barely make it out. “I don’t.”

Gwen frowned again. “Then why…”

“Because I wanted you to have to try.” Tosh shut her eyes, and swallowed. “It’s always so _easy_ for you, Gwen. Everything that takes your fancy just falls into your lap. Joining Torchwood. Other… other things. I thought it would do you good to have to sweat for something.” Tosh twisted her head around. Gwen was relieved to see the ghost of a smile. “And only slightly because you wear ‘nude and sweaty’ so well.”

Gwen smiled back. “At the risk of repetition, Tosh, you’re not so shabby in that department yourself.”

She was uniquely well-placed to see the propagation of the smaller woman’s blush. “You’re just being nice.”

“Seriously. Your complexion has that whole ‘burnished with exertion’ thing going there. All I get from a naked work-out is a chance to count my freckles.”

“But they’re so pretty.”

“Do you think so? People took the piss out of them something rotten at school.”

“Oh yes. And when your muscles tense, the freckles don’t just move; their relative positions shift as well. The saraband of skin. It’s rather beautiful.”

“I wish I saw the world with your eye for details, Tosh. Even the faintly pervy ones.” Gwen sighed. “So: do you concede?”

She felt Tosh’s body relax. “Yes.”

“Thank you.” Gwen rose, a little unsteadily, and helped Tosh to her feet. “Well fought, Ms. Sato”

“Well fought, Ms. Cooper. What are your initial orders as acting head of Torchwood Three?”

“First: we get into some clothes before we both die of hypothermia, and hit the showers. Second: we send the requested recording of our correctly-executed Emergency Command Protocols to the MoD. Third: I despatch an accompanying note making it clear that if those recordings turn up tomorrow on YouTube with a Duran Duran sound-track, then Torchwood’s resident tech genius will break the Internet across her shapely and deceptively powerful knees. Fourth: we tell Ianto and Owen that they have to execute the Third-Place Decider Protocol.”

Tosh paused with her arms half-way into her blouse, and raised an eyebrow. “But there wasn’t a Third-Place Decider Protocol.”

“There is now.” Gwen finished buttoning up her jeans, and grinned evilly. “Bring popcorn.”

FINIS


End file.
